Our Story
and Authors
Prologue
Fiction Beer Company was originally a tale about a book dork and beer geek (and an awesome team of investors) who decided to rewrite the Denver beer scene by combining the two wonderfully imaginative crafts of beer and literature together. Opened in September 2014, Fiction Beer is Denver's first brewery located on Colfax Ave. The surrounding East Denver neighborhoods of Park Hill, Montclair, Central Park, Mayfair, and Lowry had a brewery to call their own.
Crafting Liquid Literature
Each of our craft beer recipes tell a different story through unique flavors, aromas, and textures that are inspired by our favorite works of fiction. As a result, some of our beers are mysteriously rich in dark plot twists; while others drip with the lightness of a serendipitous adventure. With so many stories to tell, we filed them into genres to guide you through your Fiction Beer experience.
Chapter One
For ten years, Ryan and Christa Kilpatrick led Fiction Beer Company with passion and heart. They centered every brew, employee, and event around being welcoming to anyone who walked through the door—and built the community that has carried this small brewery through the years. After all those years, it became clear that it was time to shift their focus from owning and running a craft brewery to spending more time as a family. In late 2024, they announced that they were looking for the right buyer(s) to take over the business and would close the taproom, at least temporarily. As fate would have it, there was still another chapter in store for Fiction.
Chapter Two
In early December 2024, when the founders of Fiction announced their imminent closure, a close group of regulars went into denial and instead asked, "what if?". What if...the regulars, trivia hosts all, banded together to save their favorite haunt? This was, for many of them, the pitch of their lifetimes. It would be an epic quest, a story of growth, self-discovery, and love.
The Hosts banded together, had their own Council of Elrond, and made their sacrifice to the Founders. Then they found themselves in possession of a lease, a walk-in full of beer, minimal understanding of an industrial brew system, and a dream. But that mattered little. They could learn a brew system, and they could paint the walls and put together a new bar top. Their dream of keeping and building a community of the bookish, preserving a legacy that brought (at least) seven people together, and making fantastically good beer would keep them going through the rough moments.
Every day, the Hosts (now Authors) deliver great beer, recommend fantastic books...and of course: Thursday Night Trivia.
The New Authors
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Co-Author | Head Brewer
The resident West Coaster, Derek brings the bitterness to this group in more ways than one. Raised off Stone and Sierra Nevada, Derek's interest in beer started very early on, brewing into a full-blown homebrewer after moving to New York. After moving to Denver in 2017, the homebrewing never picked back up with general life getting in the way.
But fate would have other plans as homebrewing would become head brewer at Fiction Beer Company (only because he drew the short straw). Like riding a bike, the ideas and creativity flowed right back as smooth as a cold lager and as bold as an imperial IPA.
Derek can't wait to tell you about the next crazy brew coming your way very soon!
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Co-Author
Anna was born in Almaty, Kazakhstan and emigrated to the U.S. in 2001. She (mostly) grew up in New York City, riding subways and avoiding tourist traffic while reading fantastic adventures and imagining explosive space battles. Anna met her husband Kyle in college and together they survived the oppressive heat and humidity (and acid-spitting snails) of Miami, Florida and moved to Denver in 2016. The first place Anna went to after getting off the flight at midnight and getting some sleep was Fiction Beer Company, and she's been in love ever since.
Right now, Anna is aggressively plowing through smutty novels and trying to finish her MSW degree before resuming the terrifying (and incredibly fun) process of writing and publishing her own novels.
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Co-Author | Mama Bear
Ali Hoskins-Kelly was born and raised in the Denver area in a Jeopardy and reading household. She went to Colorado State University and has a degree she never used in Biological Anthropology. She did, however, use those anthropology skills in various stores and restaurants during her time living in Kansas City. It was in Kansas City that Ali went to her first trivia night at the old Record Bar, and ended up playing there for 8 years until they closed.
After 9 years it was time to move with her new husband, John, back to Denver to raise children close to her family. She lives in Park Hill with her husband and two blonde children. She loves gardening, crochet, and reading cozy smutty romance novels. Out of a desire to get out of the house and back to her trivia roots, Ali came to Fiction, first playing by herself at the bar while she addressed holiday cards, then eventually she was invited to join the other owners to form a trivia empire, and the rest is history.
Brewery ownership was never in the plan, but sometimes, Ali knows now, you just need to leap.
Favorite Book:
A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers
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Taproom Manager | Events & MarketingLore says that her first words were, “By self.” But these days, she’s doing things far from on her own.
Growing up in Kirkwood, MO, a suburb of St Louis, was a life full of books, salsiccias from The Hill, Lion’s Choice, toasted ravioli, and Imo’s Pizza (yes, she does have a list of food to eat every time she goes back to visit).
You could argue that she’s the stereotypical result of her education: a Bachelor’s in English with minors in History and Cultural Anthropology + a Master’s in Media Communications. But those years in school certainly grew many skills she uses to this day—and allowed her to travel to Ireland for a summer and live in London, England for a year.
The plan wasn’t to move to Colorado, but her pit-stop on the way to Los Angeles to work in film/TV production ended up turning into home. Now she’s lived in Denver for over 11 years.
Four-plus years ago, her journey with Fiction started with becoming a trivia regular as part of the Thin Mints, then becoming a bartender, and shortly after, taproom manager. Being part of the current team at Fiction is not what she would have predicted 10 years ago, but sometimes the universe puts you right where you should be.
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Co-Author
Ted grew up in the St. Louis area, developing the annoying habit of quizzing people about irrelevant but possibly interesting and strange facts. He often had a Guinness Book of Records nearby; early foreshadowing of mixing beer with intellectual competition.
Shortly after moving to Colorado in 2005, he began homebrewing, a rite of passage to becoming a true resident of the Denver area. This hobby began with simple kits using extracts and quickly evolved to creating his own full mash recipes. There was always a focus on developing a solid base in each style before branching out into flavors.
That love for irrelevant facts and good beer led him to regularly attending Thursday night trivia at Fiction Beer Company as a member of the team, “The Thin Mints.” After some time, he was invited to join the team of independent hosts. Two years into that adventure, the founders of Fiction Beer Co. announced the brewery closure was imminent.
Always of the mind to gather information, he started asking questions about what it would take to save the brewery that so many love. As it seems that trait is common among the trivia-minded, the other trivia hosts were all having similar thoughts. An astonishingly short amount of time later, Ted was part of a team of Trivia hosts who now carry on the legacy of the founders of Fiction Beer Co.
Favorite book:
The Art of Racing in the Rain by Garth Stein
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Co-Author | Brand Ambassador
John is definitely not writing this bio under duress.
Raised in Littleton, John has been living in Denver after attending CU Boulder and being introduced to the finest beers one could have in an avocado green kegerator. He is the resident maintenance man and mechanic for anything that plugs in or moves at the brewery. In his spare time, he enjoys random motorcycle trips and taking on questionable project vehicles.
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Co-Author
Kyle is an avid and voracious reader with a proclivity for scifi and fantasy featuring dragons, with the occasional foray into historical fiction. Science fiction definitely influenced his decision to study biomedical engineering, and now an interest in innovative techniques being used in the brewing industry. He spent most of his childhood in the north east, then college in Miami where he met his equally nerdy wife, Anna. He has been at Fiction pretty much every week since moving to Colorado in 2016.
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Co-Author | Social Media Guru
Growing up, Elise could always be found with her nose in a book and dream of being able to say she read for a living. Originally hailing from just north of New York City (don’t call it upstate), she took a turn somewhere along the way and started crafting pastries instead of crafting stories. It took some time, but she also came to realize that there was better beer out there than the Natty Ice that she drank in college. She moved to Denver in 2017 and was ecstatic to find a place that combined her love of reading and a well made beer. She describes her taste in books to be as dark as her taste in beer, but don’t ask her what her favorite is unless you would like a detailed list that spans many genres. Owning a brewery had never crossed her mind but her friends in culinary school must have been psychic when they nominated her as: “most likely to own a micro-brewery/patissier.”
